Robotic automation is used to supplement humans in certain capacities and replace humans in other capacities more suited or more efficient for the robots to perform. The increasing impact of robotic automation can be seen in many fields. One such field is commerce and e-commerce, in particular.
With respect to e-commerce, robots assist in various tasks related to customer order fulfillment including traversing a warehouse in order to locate, pick, and retrieve ordered items. Robots can be more efficient in these tasks than humans because of their ability to run almost continuously during all hours of the day. Robots can also be configured with special purpose hardware and software that allows them to perform tasks faster than humans or without supplemental equipment. For instance, robots can be configured with maps or rely on hardware sensors to rapidly locate item locations in a vast warehouse. Robots could also move faster than humans, carry more items than a human, and use lifts to reach locations inaccessible by humans without a ladder as some examples.
However, these efficiencies are dependent on proper command and control of the robots. A robot with the fastest means of locomotion can be entirely inefficient if it is continually taking sub-optimal paths to reach a destination or is continually running into obstructions and rerouting. Robots are also inefficient if they operate independent of one another rather than operate as a collective swarm. For example, two robots may travel the same distance in order for each robot to retrieve a different item from a common location. In this case, it would be more efficient for the first robot to retrieve both items from the common location while the second robot sets about retrieving a third item at a different location or performs some other tasks. As another example, it would be more efficient for a first robot already at a first location to retrieve an item from that first location and a second robot already at a second location to retrieve an item from that second location, rather than have the first robot travel to the second location to retrieve an item and the second robot travel to the first location to retrieve an item.
These command and control problems are exacerbated as more robots are deployed in the same site and the robots are used in performing similar or non-distinct tasks. Isolated command and control of individual robots cannot optimize for resource sharing and other conflicts that undoubtedly occur once the robots set about their individual tasks.
For these and other reasons, a workflow management system is needed to provide coordinated command and control for a plurality of robots operating in a common site. As humans remain an integral component to many of the workflows that involve robots, there is a need for the workflow management system to also coordinate human and robot interactions as well as human-to-human interactions.
In summary, there is a need for a workflow management system that maximizes efficiency and productivity of robots, humans, and other resources. More specifically, there is a need for the workflow management system to coordinate and control interactions of the robots, humans, and other resources in a collective and holistic manner.